NFL 2025 team previews countdown: From No. 32 Tennessee Titans to No. 1 ... ?
A new preview will drop every weekday (except July 4) as we get closer to the Detroit Lions facing the Los Angeles Chargers in Canton, Ohio. Who will be No. 1 going into the season? Where will your team rank? Here's your guide for all the answers. Click on below to jump to that team, then click on the team name to read the full preview.
No. 32 Titans
No. 31 Saints
No. 30 Browns
(Grant Thomas/Yahoo Sports)
A 3-14 season was a wake-up call. The Tennessee Titans not only fell to the bottom of the NFL, they slid deep into obscurity. Tennessee was truly awful but other than regular Will Levis memes and first-year head coach Brian Callahan's outward hostility toward Levis, nobody cared. They had no identity, no marketable star, a decayed roster and only one hope for the future.
That hope was the first pick of the draft. The Titans could have traded that pick or taken Travis Hunter or Abdul Carter, but they knew the best path back to relevance was hitting on a pick at quarterback. That's why Cam Ward, who set an NCAA record with 158 touchdown passes at Incarnate Word, Washington State and then Miami, is a Titan.
There's a long way to go and Ward won't fix all of that. There were a few bright spots on the roster — Jeffery Simmons is a star on the defensive line, 2024 rookies DT T'Vondre Sweat and CB Jarvis Brownlee Jr. had promising debuts, Tony Pollard and Calvin Ridley had 1,000-yard seasons in a bad situation — but rebuilding will take a while. If Ward hits, at least that's a start.
(Grant Thomas/Yahoo Sports)
The plan for the Saints always seemed to be that when Drew Brees retired, there would be a total teardown. That really didn't happen. It still hasn't happened four years after Brees' last game. The Saints weren't recklessly aggressive as usual this offseason, but didn't blow things up and didn't make moves that would indicate they have the self awareness to know they should be in a rebuild. They still have a terrible 2026 cap situation and one of the oldest rosters in the NFL. Even a brutal 15-game stretch to end the season didn't force them into facing reality.
Maybe it needs to get even worse for the Saints to realize they're at rock bottom. And it might. Kellen Moore is a rookie head coach and he does not step into a good situation. Derek Carr retired and while he wasn't great for New Orleans, the remaining quarterback solution is probably second-round pick Tyler Shough, a curious pick for a fading team considering he'll turn 26 years old in September. The surrounding cast has some recognizable names who have had good careers but is short on stars who are still in their prime. The Saints' only blue-chip player under 28 years old might be receiver Chris Olave, but he hasn't played a full season in the NFL due to four confirmed concussions.
New Orleans has reached a point in which a horrific season is the best outcome. It would be a wake-up call and perhaps lead to a franchise-changing quarterback. Like the first two games last season, the Saints' idea that they can turn things around doing things the same old way seems to be nothing but a mirage.
(Grant Thomas/Yahoo Sports)
The Cleveland Browns were the last to know that Deshaun Watson was one of the NFL's worst quarterbacks. It had to be cathartic for Browns fans to hear owner Jimmy Haslam say the team "took a big swing and miss with Deshaun." Everyone else knew that long ago. The Browns were in deep denial.
A key decision at the top of the draft was the unofficial start of reshaping the roster. The Browns passed on the chance to draft Travis Hunter second overall to get a huge haul from the Jacksonville Jaguars in a trade. It included the fifth overall pick and the Jags' first-round pick next year. It had to be hard to give up Hunter, but it was probably the right move.
The big part of the rebuild will be figuring out quarterback, and the Browns are taking a shotgun approach to it this year. They have four relatively low-cost quarterbacks and are praying one is the answer. Joe Flacco is the 40-year-old stopgap, Kenny Pickett is the reclamation project, Dillon Gabriel was the rookie the Browns drafted proactively in the third round, and Shedeur Sanders is the fifth-round pick everyone wants to talk about. If Sanders climbs up from fourth on the depth chart and starts any games this season, the Browns suddenly will become one of the most watched teams in the league.
The process starts over. Hopefully for Cleveland it's not as long and difficult as the last one, and with some positive results this time.
No. 29: To be revealed Thursday
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